Well it doesn't appear as if many people on this board have had hyperopic lasik with the Allegretto. I'm still debating the idea of having the procedure but not as enthusiastic about the idea as I was a few months ago. I'm +5 left eye and +3.5 right eye with some astigmatism in each eye. I had a consultation with another doctor who has performed over 40,000 lasik procedures and has worked on many systems including LADAR, VISX, and Allegretto. He said he would not even consider doing hyperopic lasik with my script on any other laser other than the Allegretto. He said other laser would take too long and end up dehydrating my corneas. Apparently the Allegretto is much faster and does not dehydrate the cornea as much. It makes sense to me... Has anybody heard this before?

The amount of tissue that is removed with every pulse of the excimer laser depends greatly on the amount of moisture in the cornea. The less moisture, the more tissue is removed per pulse. The longer the eye is exposed, the more likely it will dehydrate.

The dehydration itself is not problematic, however the laser treatment is based upon a normally hydrated eye. If the eye becomes dehydrated for a portion of the laser treatment, the laser will remove too much tissue and overcorrect. In your case, you would go from hyperopia (farsighted, longsighted) into myopia (nearsighted, shortsighted).

It is possible for the doctors to reduce the amount of energy applied in an attempt to balance the dehydration effect. This is all part of a well-planned treatment.

Your very high hyperopia would be difficult to treat successfully and some eventual regression of effect is almost assured. You may achieve improvement, but you would be at a higher risk of a poor outcome.